ghosts of tomorrow
by BittersweetSonata
Summary: He is haunted by humans.— Levi centric


**title: **Ghosts of Tomorrow

**summary: **Levi is haunted by humans.

**setting: **In canon

**notes: **Because I feel that Levi needs more love and I don't know why. Every character in this manga breaks my heart. By the time it's finished, I'll be an emotional wreck. Cheers.

**disclaimer: **I own nothing.

* * *

_._

_{you bleed just to know you're alive}_

_._

* * *

Levi stares at the empty table and chairs. He's the only one there – the others, his new squad, are already asleep for the night. It's dark outside, and there's a storm brewing. He can hear it, he can feel it.

He runs a finger over the table and looks at it. A ghost of a smile appears and he lets out a half laugh.

It's dirty.

He chalks it up to Jean's half-assed cleaning job, but tonight it doesn't bother him. It makes him feel nostalgic. Makes him think of his past squad. Because Erd used to be the same way.

Levi is not an old man, but he feels that way. He's seen far too much for a man of his age, but then, so has everyone else on his new squad.

Two recruits in particular.

People talk. They say that you have to be crazy to join the Survey Corps. It makes Levi grin.

Not crazy – just ready to be out of this hellhole they call home. Out of the walls that squeeze and constrict, that protect the remains of humanity, but at the same time act as a prison.

Zoe does it because, well, he's not entirely sure. She's stated several reasons, and he even thinks she might be a _little _different in the head, but she's a good person. She does it because she wants to protect her friends, and there's also a great chance that she just wants to experiment on the Titans. But she is never unkind, even to them. No matter if she's stabbing a pole in their eyes.

It sort of freaks him out, but he understands.

Eren joined because he wants to slaughter and exterminate every last Titan on the face of the earth. Levi gets that too. The kid has been through too much for someone his age.

Mikasa joined to protect Eren, no doubt.

That one's pretty clear to him.

He doesn't know. He doesn't know everyone's reasons and on most days he wouldn't give a shit, but tonight, he is feeling melancholy. Not quite like himself.

Levi feels like he's torn between death and life – like he's trapped in some sort of hellish limbo.

His friends and comrades are dying every day and he just watches. He fights, too, but you can't save everyone and he _knows _that.

Doesn't mean he can't hate it, though.

He'll die one day, he knows. Whether it be by a Titan – although it better _not _be, by old age, by the pain inside him, or by the hand of another human being, he doesn't know. But he'll die, just like everyone else will, eventually.

You can't live forever.

He sits and he stares.

He is haunted – by humans, by memories, by unspoken words, by regrets and mistakes.

Everyone has their demons, but Levi's torture and torment him. They bring him to his knees. They mock and they scream, and he can only bear it because _what the hell can he do about it? _

Ghosts of his past will always follow him, ghosts of his future will forever be waiting for him to catch up. And Levi is stuck somewhere in-between – in the present. Where those ghosts are alive but dead at the same time and he has to watch them waste away.

He fights the Titans because he wants to save them before it's too late.

He genuinely cares about his subordinates despite what anyone may think.

He even loves one, but she is long gone and never coming back.

Levi sees her in his dreams though. She is all sunshine smiles and tinkling laughter, and _that _is what haunts him the most. Her. She's the one. She never taunts him, never mocks him, she's just _there_. Quiet and patient.

She's always the one to bring him to his knees, gasping for breath because it just _hurts. _There is nothing that can fill that void in his life – in his heart.

Love.

Marriage.

Life.

Death.

He scoffs and feels the need to swear profusely. So he does. He mocks the stupid wall religion, he curses the Royal Guard – the ones who retreat into the very depths of the wall and leave the rest to die, and he swears he will find out who's behind all of this if it's the last thing he ever does.

Levi stands and moves to retire for the night when he sees it.

Petra is there, standing outside the window. A moonbeam shining through the thick storm clouds illuminates her figure and he has to shake his head and assure himself that he has not been drinking. Which he hasn't, so why is he hallucinating?

It's a spur of the moment decision, really. He moves toward the window, toward the smiling figure on the other side. She's just as beautiful as he remembers – maybe more. It probably has something to do with the fact that the last memory he has of her is her against a tree, with her spine broken and golden honey eyes dull with death.

She has her hand on the window, pale fingertips against the cool opaque panes. He reaches out and places his over hers, but it doesn't touch. It will _never _touch.

Petra smiles at him.

He blinks.

She is gone.

He feels his stomach drop and be replaced with something heavy with dread and longing.

Levi will always be too far, and too late.

The world is ugly, bloody, damning, horrifying, and yet, it is beautiful.

_He is haunted by humans._


End file.
